Cricket: Patient Prichard keeps the pretenders at bay

Somerset 202 and 88-6

Essex 265

BY ALL probability Essex ought to defeat the leading pretenders to their crown by a good few streets today. Should they do so, the credit will go primarily to their acting captain, Paul Prichard, for setting the kind of example one normally associates with his gaffer.

Looking on as one colleague after another committed hara-kiri before lunch, Prichard played sensibly within his means, driving sweetly and precisely on both sides of the wicket to score 123 off 241 balls. Locating a durable ally at last in Derek Pringle, he marshalled a stand of 118 in 39 overs for the sixth wicket to ensure a useful lead.

Such riches seemed distant and unlikely while Essex were losing four men in 15 overs. Prichard, John Stephenson and Salim Malik have now mustered just two scores of 50 or more between them in 19 Championship innings, a far cry from last season's prolific output that saw seven members of the order average more than 43.

The rot set in yesterday when Jonathan Lewis drove at a wideish one from Graham Rose for Chris Tavare to swallow the speeding edge with typical nonchalance at second slip. Dropped by Pakistan after being dubbed 'a flat-track bully' by Imran Khan - an odd epithet for someone who managed 166 without being dismissed in last year's Headingley Test - Malik has fluctuated wildly this season, departing second ball in both innings against Yorkshire, before plundering Derbyshire for 132. This was one of his forgettable days. Aiming an extravagant drive at Neil Mallender to the first ball he received, he lost his off-stump.

Nasser Hussain and Mike Garnham gave Tavare some needless catching practice before sense prevailed, Prichard and Pringle getting their heads down to put the pitch into perspective. Nevertheless, the last five wickets vanished in a trice, young Jason Kerr picking up three with his accurate seamers.

By the time Somerset had cleared the arrears, the glow at keeping Essex within range had long since been replaced by a fearful lump in the throat. Indeed the forecast was gloomy from the moment Steve Andrew deflected Mark Lathwell's drive into the non- striker stumps to strand Andy Hayhurst.

While Lathwell fiddled merrily the other members of the crew were well and truly burned. Pringle and Don Topley did the business at slip to eject Richard Harden and Tavare, while Neil Foster, as perky as he has been all season, yorked Neil Burns and trapped Rose. It was Hussain who brought the house down, though, a flying one-handed effort at long leg confounding Nick Folland and persuading Somerset that this really was not their day.